1798 - First decade of Indian policy

The first Indian treaty, with the Delawares, in 1778

In the first decade
of the republic, the federal government had attempted to bring
order to the chaos of Indian affairs in the south, but they were
stymied by obdurate state legislators who refused to recognized the
sanctity of Indian treaties. click here for more

Southern
frontiersmen in Georgia, North Carolina, Tennessee, Georgia were
infuriated by the treaties of Colerain and New York, as the feds
had given back to the Creeks the land that Georgia had (illegally)
obtained by cession from parts of that tribe during the 1780s. click here for more

Ad usual, American settlers
ignored the legalities associated with Indian lands and continued
to push across Indian frontiers, Despite federal efforts to
enforce boundaries, the Creeks and Cherokees engaged in sporadic
warfare on the frontier settlements with whites determined to
encroach on their lands. For their part, the Indians resented
the land cessions they had already made in a number of treaties
that followed the revolution. The new incursions on Indian
lands by southern frontiersmen rubbed salt in old wounds.

Yet the federal government
still hoped that firmly established boundaries and orderly advance
of white settlers would produce peace.